Q
- THE WINGED SERPENT With David Carradine, Michael Moriarty, Candy Clark,
Richard Roundtree, James Dixon Directed by Larry Cohen Far fetched but
highly entertaining, New York City becomes the hunting ground or a giant flying
serpent, that turns out to be an Aztec serpent god, Quetzelcoatl. With cool stop-animation
and surprisingly acceptable performances, this transcends the B-movie status expected
of it. As the man behind the It's
Alive
series and other Moriarty starring enjoyable schlock-fests like The
Stuff,
Cohen has produced some interesting, while not prize-winning entertainment. 4 / B - PB QUEEN
OF THE DAMNED With Stuart Townsend, Marguerite Moreau, Aaliyah, Vincent Perez,
Lena Olin Directed by Michael Rymer Neil
Jordan made the best of Anne Rice's Interview
With The Vampire, giving blood
sucking movie fans a great screen debut of Lestat (played by Tom Cruise). With
this further look at Lestat and his earth bound antics, it can be seen as both
a sequel and prequel. This time round Lestat fronts a hard rock band and threatens
to divulge too much of his kind, taunting them to come out of the shadows and
get him. His main plot is to resurrect the Queen of the Damned. Ooh, not
very scary, unfortunately. The prequel bit comes in where a woman (who is part
of a secret vampire investigating society) reads through Lestat's journal, running
us through the tale of how the mortal man became an immortal vampire several centuries
ago. Even though this is Aaliyah's final role before her untimely death, she does
very little to convince as the bad-ass title character - in fact often provoking
a giggle at the artificially "sexy-evil" act. The attempt to make this a dark
and sexy horror thriller failed. A lot of posing and prancing sometimes makes
it look as though a fashion house composed the scenes for extras and bit part
players. Great sets, sure, but in many ways the soundtrack far outstrips the movie
when it comes to impact. No wonder the Jordan-Cruise director-acting team failed
to turn up for this gig. 2 / C - PB

QUEEN+
- The Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert Special 10th Anniversary Edition
Could it have been a decade since this tribute show? And has Freddie
departed our dimension for even more years? This particular AIDS awareness and
remembrance show with the surviving Queen
members pulled in an incredible mix of high profile artists to partake in some
classic Queen
songs - and attracting a 72,000 strong audience to electrify the Wembley Stadium
on 20 April 1992 as result. While the flamboyance and unique vocal prowess of
Freddie Mercury
is a hard one to match, the guests give it their personal touch as a homage (any
attempts to copy Freddie
being an act of futility). One of the most accomplished artists to fit into this
one-off spectacular, giving it his all has to be George
Michael, whose
voice matches the songs so well. But with people like David
Bowie (who
actually does the Lord's Prayer halfway through his set), Elton
John and Robert
Plant, you
know you're in the presence of greatness. Other artists include Roger
Daltery (The
Who), James
Hetfield (Metallica),
Liza Minelli,
Seal,
Lisa Stansfield,
Tony Iommi
(Black Sabbath),
Annie Lennox
etc. While Slash
is as cool as ever, the other Guns
'n Roses element
of Axl Rose
is both hilarious and embarrassing. The songs include classics like We Will
Rock You, Under Pressure, Tie Your Mother Down, Radio Ga Ga, Somebody To Love,
Bohemian Rhapsody, Crazy Little Thing Called Love, Who Wants To Live Forever,
We Are The Champions and more. While watching the show, an information icon
appears at the beginning of some songs - on clicking at this point you get launched
into a special portion where you can view the rehearsal of that particular song.
The second disc contains an extensive TV documentary of the show as well as Freddie
Inserts and a Photo Gallery. A detailed 24 page booklet rounds this off as a great
historic event, albeit a bittersweet one. 6 / B - PB

QUEEN
ON FIRE - Live At The Bowl
I got excited when I saw this title, thinking it may be their show my brother
and I attended at Sun City's Super Bowl during their tour with The Works.
This one is a bit earlier, though, recorded at the Milton Keynes Bowl on 5 June
during their Hot Space Tour of 1982. At this stage the band had been at
it for a decade with a string of great albums and great songs, rising to become
one of the world's biggest rock bands, the huge outdoor turnout evidence enough.
They were to go for another decade, rising still, before Freddie died - and this
tragedy happened ten years ago! Shot on video, the lights streak and make some
of the pictures look a little plastic, but Freddie's magnetic stage presence and
the band's precision is too prominent to let a technical detail like that bother
a true fan. The 25-track show opens with a recording of their Flash theme
track and closes with their rendition of God Save The Queen. In between
you get Queen
classics like We Will Rock You, Bohemian Rhapsody, Crazy Little Thing Called
Love, Another One Bites The Dust, Under Pressure, Fat Bottomed Girls, Play The
Game, Somebody To Love and We Are The Champions. Obviously there's
a Brain May guitar solo as well as tracks like Action This Day, Dragon Attack
and Sheer Heart Attack. At the time of this show the band's new lighting
set-up was a state of the art technological first (paled by today's advances).
The second disc includes interviews backstage at the show as well as additional
ones from Freddie and Brian & Roger respectively, highlighting their career at
that stage, the new material, the tour, lighting etc. Additional Tour Highlight
footage from Austria and Japan include another dozen or so songs with a couple
not featured on the main show disc. I'm sure there is a whole bunch of shows and
footage still to make its way onto DVD, this being just one of them and a fan
essential. 4 / A - PB

QUEEN
+ Paul Rodgers - Return Of The ChampionsWhile there is no substitute
for Freddie Mercury, Paul Rodgers perfroms acceptable renditions of some favourtie
Queen
tunes with two of its original members Brian May and Roger Taylor (not too sure
where bassist Roger Deacon is - retired I guess). What makes it cool is the fact
that Taylor and May sing a fair share of the songs. This live show in Sheffield
packs in 27 tracks, not all Queen
numbers, but also a few classic covers: Wishing Well, Feel Like Makin' Love,
Can't Get Enough, and All Right Now. But, you also get timeless tracks
like Tie Your Mother Down, I Want To Break Free, Fat Bottomed Girls, Another
One Bites The Dust, Crazy Little Thing Called Love, Love Of My Life, Hammer To
Fall, I'm In Love With My Car, Last Horizon, These Are The Days Of Our Lives,
We Will Rock You, We Are The Champions and Bohemian Rhapsody with Freddie
singing along from a video projection of an old live show! Amid the songs you
get solo's, speeches, as well as acoustic numbers. Unfortunately there is no bonus
footage like a documentary on how the show got put together or how they decided
upon and selected Rodgers. But you do get an extra clip of May doing an acoustic
version (with the crowd) of John
Lennon's Imagine
- this was at the tribute concert in Hyde Park for the London emergency services
and victims after the 7 July 2005 bombings. 4 / B - PB

QUEENSR˙CH
- Operation LIVE:crimeIn
the Metal-Rock years of the late 80's with bands like Metallica
and Guns & Roses
dominating, there was one act that ventured into a conceptual realm which was
quite ahead of its time and separated them from the mainstream of both commercial
and more extreme Metal. Queensr˙ch's
melodic and superbly crafted music was perfectly complimented by the voice of
Geoff Tate.
This pivotal moment in the band's history still lives on today in the fans who
were touched by its scope and magnitude at the time of its release. By releasing
it on DVD its full expanse, quality and timeless relevance can be experienced
in digital clarity & perfection. The live show's precise co-ordination and execution
with its lighting, projection and other integrated facets is as much a treat as
the in depth story woven throughout this mammoth musical experience. The DVD also
includes interviews with Tate
on how the band started and how the Operation: Mindcrime studio project
came about and evolved into a live phenomenon. The complete "LIVE:crime Story"
from the original box set is also a part of this DVD whereby the entire story
can be followed complete with the songs & lyrics. Two hidden bonus tracks can
also be searched for, hints given on their website. Only some of the band members'
fashion serves as a time capsule give-away, the music so good it doesn't belong
to any period. This is one hell of a show and I was never aware of the bands subliminal
popularity at the time. I also thought they'd given up long ago, but they still
seem to be going strong with a dedicated following most of whom are still with
them from the early days. The DVD also includes a picture gallery compiled from
fan photos. 5 / A - PB